


Hamilton in the Library

by FullMoonFlight



Series: 2k16 writing challenge [2]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: College AU, F/M, unapologetic Hamilton fangirling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-18
Updated: 2016-01-18
Packaged: 2018-05-14 16:35:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5750347
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FullMoonFlight/pseuds/FullMoonFlight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Based on the prompt "I heard your music because you’re sitting beside me and I MUST talk to you about it.” Clarke was just trying to study, but she couldn't help herself when she heard the music playing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hamilton in the Library

**Author's Note:**

> I'd apologise for the Hamilton fangirling, but I regret nothing. There are no spoilers if you haven't heard/seen it yet and you don't need any prior knowledge of the play to read this, though you'll probably like this better if you have.

The library was mostly empty at this time of the night, which wasn’t that surprising since it was a Friday and there were still a few weeks until people started worrying about finals. Clarke had gotten into the habit of doing as much homework as she could on Friday nights pretty early in her college career so she would have at least one day off. She had started going to the library halfway through her first semester back in freshman year when her roommate insisted on being as loud and drunk as possible because she thought it was unnatural for someone to study on a Friday night and the tradition had stuck. (She’d also taken great pleasure in the fact that her roommate proceeded to fail half her classes that semester. Needless to say, they didn’t room together again in sophomore year.)

Clarke liked her Friday nights in the library. There were never more than a handful of people in the building with her, so she had plenty of space to herself and didn’t have to worry about someone getting riled up because she dared cough or breathe too loudly. She had a spot she considered hers on the third floor, in the back. It was fairly private, there were only three desks in the area and surrounded by books on history on all sides. She had discovered it sometime in her sophomore year and had had it to herself for the most part for almost a year, but in the past couple of months someone else had joined her. She had been annoyed at first, there were plenty of desks all over the library where he could sit _far away from her_ but she couldn’t very well blame him for it when she noticed he spent most nights picking books from the nearby shelves when she’d chosen the spot because of the privacy and the short distance to the vending machine.

Despite her annoyance the first couple of nights he showed up, the stranger sharing her space didn’t bother Clarke too much. He kept to himself and didn’t make too much noise. They nodded at each other in greeting at the start of the night but had never spoken a word to each other. Most of the time Clarke managed to forget he was even there, as she concentrated on her assignments.

Tonight was not one of those nights. It wasn’t so much his fault, he wasn’t doing anything unusual to cause her to be so distracted. It was just one of those days where she just could not concentrate, no matter how hard she tried. Instead she had spent the past 10 minutes at least staring into space and listening intently. The guy was listening to some music, which was fairly usual for him and in the silence of the library the sound travelled far enough for Clarke to hear a vague imitation of the song. It usually didn’t bother her, but she could _swear_ she knew what album he was listening to, it just wasn’t loud enough for her to name it.

At some point while trying to figure out the album she had turned her eyes towards the guy across from her and was now realising that she had been staring rather intensely at him for far longer than was considered socially acceptable. Clarke had never paid much attention to him before, but now that she was looking she realised he was actually quite good looking. His curly hair fell over his eyes and every now and then he’d absentmindedly brush it away, only for it to fall back seconds later. He had broad shoulders and muscular arms resting on the desk in front of him as he read. As she looked Clarke couldn’t help the image of gorgeous abs and tan skin that flashed into her head and for a second her fingers itched to either draw him or run all over his body.

Unfortunately for her, the handsome stranger had noticed her staring if the amused smirk on his face was any indicator. Her suspicions were proven when he proceeded to remove one of his earbuds so he could hear her.

“Can I help you?”

“Oh, no sorry… uh, its’s just- your music…” she started, flustered at having been caught staring.

“Oh shit is it too loud? Sorry, I didn’t notice.” As he apologised he took hurriedly took his phone from his pocket and quickly turned the music down so that Clarke couldn’t hear anything.

“No. Well, yes I can hear it but it’s no problem. It’s just… I swear I’ve heard it before but I can’t figure out what it is.”

“It’s Hamilton… The musical?” It was more of a question than a statement, as though he couldn’t quite believe she knew what he was talking about.

“Of course! I can’t believe I didn’t get that,” she only barely managed to stop herself from smacking her palm against her forehead. It should have been obvious really. Even though it was awhile since she had listened to it now, she’d had the soundtrack on repeat for weeks after seeing the play in New York over the holidays. Clarke hesitated for a second, wondering if she should leave him to his studying, but none of her friends liked musicals enough to bother listening to it so she couldn’t help herself. “I love Hamilton. I saw it over the holidays, it’s amazing.”

“You’ve actually seen it?” It sounded as though he couldn’t decide whether to be jealous or impressed. “I heard it’s practically impossible to get tickets, they’re almost entirely sold out.”

“Yeah,” she chuckled awkwardly. Her mother had complained loudly about how expensive the tickets had been and how hard it had been to get seats for the three of them together, but she’d been the one to insist that if Clarke spent Christmas in New York with her and Kane Clarke would get to plan one night out for them, so they could “get to know each other”. Clarke hadn’t known much about Hamilton beforehand, she’d mostly chosen it because it was new and if it happened to have a lot of rapping, which Abby Griffin hated, well… that was just a coincidence. “The tickets were sort of a Christmas gift.”

“Some gift,” he sighed almost wistfully, making Clarke smile. She really shouldn’t find a grown man daydreaming about tickets to a hip hop musical about one of the Founding Fathers as charming as she did. “I hope I get to see it one day. Was it as amazing as I think it is? My name is Bellamy, by the way.”

“I’m Clarke. And no,” she grinned as Bellamy looked at her expectantly, his eyes resembling that of a puppy’s rather than the grad student he was. “Even better.”

“Great, so now I _have_ to see it,” he laughed. “Have you seen the ham4ham shows?”

“Oh yeah! I love them. There was even one the day I was there, but I didn’t know about them until after the show so I missed it.” It still stung a bit, that she’d been so close and missed it. Ham4ham seemed to be an experience in itself, if they hadn’t moved the lottery and thus the shows online shortly after she probably would’ve asked her mom to book her a flight under the pretence of coming for a visit, just so she could witness it at least once.

They chatted for a while longer, discussing anything from favourite characters (Clarke’s was Burr, Bellamy preferred Eliza) and songs (Bellamy’s was Your Obedient Servant, Clarke could listen to Cabinet Battle #1 forever) to the various ham4ham shows they had seen. After a while they reached a lull in the conversation, which made Clarke realise she had just spent at least an hour gushing over a musical when Bellamy had been trying to studying. It had been a long time since she met someone she could talk to so easily so quickly and here she was, being the annoying person who wouldn’t stop talking in the library. Even though he’d seemed happy to talk to her, she couldn’t help the pang of embarrassment she felt.

“Anyway, sorry for attacking you with my fangirling. And possibly being a super creep staring at you like that,” she joked. “I’ll let you get back to your studying.”

“It’s fine, really! I was just about to give up anyway,” he gestured towards his books with a grin. “It’s been a nice change from reading. I like history as much as the next History major, but this book is about as interesting as watching paint dry.”

He started packing up his things slowly, every now and then he’d look up at her for just a second before busying himself with his books again. Once he’d put his things in his backpack and had a pile of books to return to the shelves he looked up to find her still staring at him

“Actually, I was going to grab something to eat… would you like to join me?” His words caused a fluttering in her stomach.

“I’d love to,” she smiled shyly.

After putting away the books they’d taken down, they walked together towards a nearby pizza place. The conversation came just as easily when they talked about themselves as it did with Hamilton and they talked all night, not noticing how much time had passed until they were asked to leave so the staff could close up.

Bellamy finally got to see Hamilton live a year and some months later, when Clarke took him to New York to celebrate his graduation. It was even better than Clarke remembered, but that might have something to do with the man sitting next to her holding her hand the entire way through.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm fullmoonflight on tumblr, come talk to me.


End file.
